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Saturday, May 2, 2009

(By Tamrat G. Giorgis, Addis Fortune ) The national flag carrier, the Ethiopian Shipping Lines (ESL), has introduced a substantial discount on the price of containers it brings to the country, senior sources in the company disclosed.

The announcement of the revision on fares was made at the Hilton two weeks ago, during a reception ESL’s management had held at its annual customers day. However, the actual size of the cut was made during a senior managers meeting held last week.

The company decided to offer its customers from a 10pc to 30pc discounted fares per container, depending from which port merchandises came from. A cost of transport per container with ESL may vary from 700 dollars to 1,500 dollars.

The revised fares were applied beginning Friday, May 1, 2009, a senior manager disclosed. The discount was attributed to drop in the global oil price and cost of spare parts, as well as the economic slowdown affecting global trade.

ESL had to revise its original target of transporting 2.5 million tonnes inbound and outbound cargo for the fiscal year down to 1.8 million tonnes, sources disclosed. This was following the result of its performance during the first quarter of the year, which had been lower than expected.

“Although our performance for the subsequent quarters was close to the revised target, we have achieved only 90pc of our plan,” a senior manager told Fortune.

Operating with nine vessels, and largely depended on slot charters (an operation where the national flagship company leases space from foreign operated vessels), ESL carried 1.8 million tonnes of cargo last year, up by 300,000tn from the previous year. And 70pc of this volume is containerised, according to a study by the Ministry of Transport and Communications. ESL carries an average of 80,000 containers annually.

Last year, it had generated 2.5 billion Br in operating revenue, representing a growth of 34pc compared to the previous year. It is very unlikely for the company to register as much growth as it did in the past couple of years, according to industry OBSERVERS. The latest move in revising its fares may result in the fall of the company’s revenue by an estimated 250 million Br.

Parenting Across Borders

The DSKM Ethiopian Orthodox Church hopes to help children preserve their culture and excel in US schools. Courtesy of DSKM Education DepartmentIn Washington, D.C.,’s long-standing Ethiopian community, many families look to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church to connect their children to the Ethiopian community. Reporter Dereje Desta visits the Re’ese Adbarat Debre Selam Kidest Mariam Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Church, which is trying to use language education and tutoring to help parents preserve culture, while improving children’s ability to access education. (audio)